Author's Note: Alas and alack! I cannot believe how long it has been since I updated this story! Please accept my most sincere and humble apologies. But the reason has not been laziness—of that I can assure you. I have been incredibly busy (the kind of busy where sometimes you go to bed at after one in the morning and get up at three), and the dynamic of my life has radically shifted since the summer. But you'll be learning about that soon because I was miraculously able to pen two chapters during the Christmas break. For those of you still waiting on replies to ancient PMs or reviews, I again apologize. I'll try to get back to you soon. Meanwhile, I hope you enjoy the latest of Estel's misadventures! Please be sure to leave me some feedback if you can.

. . .

All students have their greatest fears. For many, its rejection. Some are worried about passing their classes. But then there are those, like Estel, who would prefer to avoid unpleasant attention if at all possible. And thus the terror that plagues such people as Thalion every waking moment is being late to class. Plus it's just rude; come on.

But as it turns out, sometimes there actually is nothing you can do to avoid it. Well, you can't avoid it if your life is being rigged by a team of conniving Snagas. And that is the scenario so delightfully placed before Sauron, who eagerly sent his minions to ruin a perfectly good morning class for his least-favorite fanfiction writer.

You see, Estel had begun to suspect that the attacks on her sanity were nearing their end. She had endured very severe trials during her summer and early fall, but they were not of the same nature as the previous sanity attacks. They were more like plain ole tragedies. But Estel found in those moments that His grace was sufficient for her, even in her weakness. And so she was grown more and more through the hardships, and she thought that this trend showed a decisive break with what Sauron had been scheming up in her freshman year. Maybe the dispensationalists were right and she had entered a new age of her life, one which didn't have any continuity with her first year of college.

That's funny.

Dark Lords are actually surprisingly patient, and so it was that Sauron awaited the perfect moment to shatter the peace that had at last settled onto Estel's life. This moment came during the middle of the night as Wednesday became Thursday, when the writer finally collapsed in a heap on her bed in her now big, empty room. Her roommate had gone back to her home state, leaving the entire space open for Estel. This might sound like a nice thing, but it meant that there was no one to help watch out for orcs.

Estel was getting very much less sleep this sophomore year, and it never took much time for her consciousness to slip into oblivion when the end of the day finally arrived. However, being a diligent student, she set her alarm so that she would have plenty of time the following morning to make it to her 8 am class. She heard some banging on the walls, but her neighbors were always disruptive, and so as she fell asleep, she didn't suspect a thing.

Foolish mortal.

The orcs had been working on secret entrances into this new apartment ever since Estel had moved in, and now was their chance to test one out. Snaga 3 was the one who drew the short straw and had to crawl through the air duct first. His armor scraped roughly along the metal walls of the small tunnel, but Estel did not stir, even when Snaga 3 let out a few unpleasant exclamations. When he reached the vent's opening, he pushed against it and accidently fell forward, crashing out of the hole and tumbling to the carpet in a heap.

"Nice going, scum," came the grunt of Snaga 299,792,458m/s from inside the air duct.

"Shut up," Snaga 3 whispered back harshly. "She's in here!"

Snaga 299,792,458m/s peeked his head out of the vent and looked down into the bedroom where the mortal slept, still unmoving. The orc snarled and climbed down to the floor, scoffing at the writer.

"I don't get why Sauron doesn't just want us to get rid of 'er once and for all," he growled, feeling the hilt of his dagger. "I'm sick of this stupid work."

"Quit yer yapping!" commanded Snaga 6.023*10^23, who joined his companions in the now crowded room. "If we killed 'er now, she'd be a martyr. And that's even worse than the annoying runt she already is."

"Not by much," chimed in Snaga 1, who made a rather loud clanging as he let the vent slam behind him, earning glares and shushing from his three companions. Estel didn't so much as flinch.

"Let's just hurry up and get out of here," Snaga 3 grumbled.

No one wanted to take orders from anyone else, but the statement was mutually felt, so the orcs set about their work. Snaga 6.023*10^23 went about the extremely difficult task of navigating Estel's phone to locate and turn off the alarm. The other three fiends started mapping out the entirety of the apartment, finding possible weaknesses in its layout and making tentative plots. Before crawling back through the airshaft, Snaga 1 went ahead and initiated another lesser plan, releasing only about one or two thousands ants into the kitchen. Satisfied, the crew of orcs slipped out of the apartment, the writer still completely oblivious.

Had the plan gone completely according to plan, Estel might have missed her entire class. Yet in a moment which would seem to disprove the idea of chance or blind fate, Thalion's exhausted form stirred from sleep all on its own. Slowly turning her sleepy gaze toward her clock, the writer's eyes shot open as she tried to process the terrible numbers which were immediately engraved into her mind.

7:48.

The speed with which Estel leapt out of her bed actually caused the radar guns to malfunction, so no one is sure just what the velocity was. Regardless, she made it to the bathroom faster than the speed of light and got ready for her day as fast as she possibly could. It was truly a miracle that the clock said 7:55 when she bolted out the front door and to her car.

Estel's school was about 10 minutes from her apartment under good circumstances, but of course, this morning none of the traffic was in the writer's favor. She wasn't sure that she didn't see an orc or two driving some of the slow vehicles around. At long last, her car raced into the school's parking lot, and she sprinted toward the door. She was late, but not too late; 8:11. It could be worse.

Then it got worse.

The Reformed world is very small, for those of you who know much about that sort of thing. But what are the chances that a semi-famous speaker would be walking around Estel's campus at 8:11 am on this particular Thursday? Well, he was. The one of whom Estel speaks is a man by the name of Chris Larson, the president and CEO of Ligonier Ministries (one of Thalion's favorite organizations in existence). As the flustered fanfiction writer scurried to the door, she stopped dead in her tracks, her mouth hanging open when she saw this hero of hers holding the door open for her.

"Good morning," he said pleasantly, flashing a smile.

"Good morning," stammered the poor writer as she entered the building, her hands shaking slightly.

He surely knew exactly what was going on; there were only two classes that morning, both beginning at 8. Only a lazy, late student would show up at this time, and her manner only confirmed that she was rushing to a class. No excuse would work. Estel tried to grin, but it was just a sheepish expression which no doubt looked as pathetic as the rest of the girl.

The nerd's celebrity didn't act like he thought twice about her state, but Thalion was pretty sure he was mentally noting her features so he could use her as an example in some speech about irresponsible kids in some conference someday. There was no more time to fret about the miserable predicament, but Estel's cheeks burned red as she slunk down the hall to her class.

More embarrassment awaited her as she was forced to do the one thing she had feared since the day she was born: walk into a class that was already in session. As expected, a thousand pairs of eyes (okay, so more like fifteen pairs, but still) shot in her direction as the door mercilessly creaked upon her entry. Estel looked stubbornly at her feet as she quickly slipped into her spot, but she could feel the professor's gaze burning straight through her. She continued to cause disruption as she unloaded her laptop and set up her little study station on the desk, all the while cursing that Morgoth-loving smartphone which surely must have been the cause of all these woes.

The drama which Estel had allowed to build slowly diminished as class dragged on. During the break, she went to the professor and apologized profusely, and the man was extremely gracious to her (seriously; he's the best, y'all). Even though she was completely and utterly mortified with her wretchedness in spite of the teacher's kindness, she felt better as she got the chance to talk with a pretty nice-looking young man both during the break and after class was over. Man, he seemed like such a great guy.

Maybe there was still something to live for after all.

. . .

You guys will never guess who happened to sit right next to me during a session of the conference I attended this past Monday, months after the above chapter's incident. Chris Larson. *facepalms* At least he didn't act like he recognized me. ;) Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the update! I should have the next chapter up presently. In the meantime, don't forget to review! Oh, and the next chapter is a doozy; you might want to be on the lookout for it. It's definitely the best chapter of this story (and maybe any story, to tell you the truth).